Between Trespass and the Razzie-nominated Just Go With It, it’s safe to say 2011 wasn’t Nicole Kidman‘s best year. Happily, her upcoming slate looks much more promising. Kidman will hit the big screen this year in Lee Daniels’ The Paperboy and Chan-wook Park’s Stoker, and the small one in HBO’s Hemingway & Gellhorn. As for her next move beyond that, Kidman has entered talks to star in Before I Go to Sleep, from 28 Weeks Later and The American scribe Rowan Jaffe.

Based on the bestselling novel by S.J. Watson, the psychological thriller revolves around a woman who wakes up each morning with no recollection of her past 20 years, due to a mysterious accident that left her suffering from amnesia. She begins using journals to try and record some of her memories, but grows suspicious of her husband Ben. Sounds a lot like Memento, or perhaps 50 First Dates if you’re feeling less charitable. [Screen Daily via Vulture]

After the jump, Joon-ho Bong’s Snow Piercer picks up that sweet simpleton from Trainspotting.

Snow Piercer may mark South Korean filmmaker Bong Joon-ho‘s first English-language picture, but his casting choices so far suggest he’s already got damn great taste in English-speaking stars. Octavia Spencer has become the latest addition to the cast of his post-apocalyptic thriller, joining Chris Evans, John Hurt, Tilda Swinton, Jamie Bell, and Song Kang-ho(The Host). The script, from Bong and Oldboy director Park Chan-wook, is an adaptation of a French graphic novel titled Le Transperceneige. More details after the jump.

Though we first heard of Bong Joon-ho‘s Snow Piercerback in 2009, it wasn’t until just a couple of weeks ago that the project really began to pick up steam and build a top-notch cast. Chris Evans was the first star announced for the film, with Tilda Swinton and Jamie Bell boarding soon afterward. Now John Hurt has been announced as the latest addition to the post-apocalyptic film, based on a French graphic novel titled Le Transperceneige. More details after the jump.

I was excited when Chris Evans was announced as the likely lead for Snow Piercer, the film that Mother and The Host director Bong Joon-ho has been developing for years and finally looks to be ready to shoot in the next few months. Evans is one of the better crop of actors in the tentpole business right now; his turn in Sunshine a few years back convinced me that he’s got a lot more to offer than just superhero-type characters.

Now he may be joined in Snow Piercer by two other great actors, Tilda Swinton and Jamie Bell, each of whom has made a good career of balancing indies with big films. Read More »

Throughout his career, Chris Evans has jumped back and forth between big-budget pics and indie films and tackled a wide range of roles in the process. And though he’s now a fast-rising star thanks to last year’s Captain America and this summer’s The Avengers, it seems he’s still interested in mixing things up, as he looks to join an especially promising project that falls on the indie end of the spectrum.

Evans has just entered talks to star in Snow Piercer, from The Host director Bong Joon-ho. That’d be enough to pique my interest already, but it gets even more intriguing from there: The film was co-written by Bong and Oldboy helmer Park Chan-wook, who’s also producing. Though neither filmmaker is a household name in the States just yet, that could be changing soon as Bong will be making his domestic directorial debut with Snow Piercer, and as Park’s wrapping up his first English-language film Stoker. More details after the jump.

Along with Park Chan-wook, Bong Joon-ho is one of the many great cinematic talents that heralded a new wave of film-making from South Korea. He’s perhaps most famous for his brilliant family-centered monster film, The Host, and his previous effort Memories of Murder breathed new life into the police procedural. While doing rounds for his latest film, Mother, Joon-ho chatted with Frosty at Collider about his next project, a post-apocalyptic sci-fi film entitled Snow Piercer—an adaptation of the French graphic novel, Le Transperceneige. The project was formerly titled Transperceneige, and is being produced by Chan-wook.